Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 62 (2021) 101292 0278-4165/© 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Review The Paleolithic of the Iranian Plateau: Hominin occupation history and implications for human dispersals across southern Asia Mohammad Javad Shoaee a, * , Hamed Vahdati Nasab b , Michael D. Petraglia a, c, d, e a Department of Archaeology, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany b Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Humanities, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran c Human Origins Program, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C. 20560, USA d School of Social Science, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia e Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution (ARCHE), Griffth University, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia A R T I C L E INFO Keywords: Pleistocene Climate Lithic Assemblages Neanderthals Homo sapiens ABSTRACT The biological and cultural evolution of hominins in Asia is a central topic of paleoanthropology. Yet, the Paleolithic archaeology of key regions of Asia, including the Iranian plateau, have not been integrated into human evolutionary studies. Here, we examine the prehistory of the Iranian plateau with a focus on Iran, one of the largest and archaeologically best-known countries in the region. After approximately eight decades of pro- fessional feldwork on the Paleolithic in Iran, a broad outline of the occupation history of the region has been achieved, though signifcant gaps remain in understanding the evolution and behavior of hominins in the region. Here we examine the history of Paleolithic investigations, synthesizing key archaeological information from the Lower Paleolithic to the EpiPaleolithic, placing emphasis on archaeological sites with stratifed deposits and dated fnds. We collect and summarize information on site locations, chronologies, rare hominin fossils, the more common lithic assemblages, and scarce worked items and symbolic objects. Our study documents considerable chronological and archaeological gaps in the Lower Paleolithic record, although Acheulean sites with charac- teristic lithics are present signaling the early colonization of the region by early hominin ancestors. The early Middle Paleolithic is poorly known owing to dating lacunae, although more abundant evidence is available from younger sites after 50,000 years ago (ka), spanning the late Middle Paleolithic, the Upper Paleolithic and the EpiPaleolithic. The fossil and archaeological evidence indicates the presence of Neanderthals in the Iranian plateau and later, Homo sapiens. The distribution of Lower to EpiPaleolithic sites are examined here, indicating both overlaps and divergences in the use of geographic areas, while pointing to large-scale research gaps in archaeological coverage. Key dispersal models are summarized, illustrating alternative views on the routes of human expansions in the Late Pleistocene, and how the Iranian plateau situates relative to the Levant, Arabia and Central Asia. 1. Introduction Western Asia plays a key role in understanding out of Africa dis- persals, and in recent years, much attention has been paid to the possible connections between Paleolithic archaeological sites in the Levant and the Arabian peninsula (Petraglia, 2003; Petraglia et al., 2011; Groucutt et al., 2015). However, there are signifcant geographic gaps in under- standing how the archaeological record of the Iranian plateau relates to Levantine and Arabian sites. Exacerbating this problem, little is known about the Paleolithic archaeology of major geographic areas adjacent to the Iranian plateau, such as in Afghanistan and Pakistan. While the situation is better in Iran, with the publication of more than a hundred Lower to EpiPaleolithic sites, fewer than twenty sites have been exca- vated, and many of these were investigated before the 1990s, using imprecise recording methods (Vahdati Nasab, 2011). Despite biases in the geographic coverage of the Iranian plateau, Paleolithic sites have indeed been reported across Iran. Paleolithic sites are situated in different environmental zones, including along the southern shores of the Caspian Sea in the north (Coon, 1951, 1957; Biglari et al., 2004; Vahdati Nasab et al., 2017), the Alborz and Zagros highlands and their intermountain valleys (Biglari and Heydari, 2001; Chevrier et al., 2006; Berillon et al., 2007; Otte et al., 2007; Jaubert * Corresponding author at: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Department of Archaeology, Kahlaische Str. 10, Jena, Thuringia 07745, Germany. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Anthropological Archaeology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jaa https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaa.2021.101292 Received 13 November 2020; Received in revised form 18 February 2021;